Consumer fireworks and regulation of food from local farmers will be on the ballot for Waldoboro voters in November, along with a commercial clean energy ordinance and proposed amendments to the town’s shellfish conservation ordinance.
The Waldoboro Select Board approved the warrant Sept. 10 for the special town meeting by referendum, which will be held concurrently with the general election Tuesday, Nov. 5.
The first ballot item concerns consumer fireworks.
The purchase, sale, and use of consumer fireworks has been prohibited in Waldoboro in most cases since July 14, 2020. Residents voted to put the ban in place by a margin of 663-643 after a citizen’s petition put forward by Raymond Perkins, who died in August 2023.
Currently, public displays put on by nonprofit entities are allowed with select board approval between 8:30-10 p.m. on certain holidays, including Memorial Day, Independence Day, and New Year’s Eve.
If this warrant article is passed, Waldoboro’s fireworks rules will revert to their pre-2020 state, allowing residents to use consumer fireworks on their own property.
However, residents must still obtain a permit, must only discharge fireworks on their own property, and cannot use fireworks within 50 feet of public land, according to the pre-2020 version of the town’s fireworks ordinance. The regulations would also prohibit fireworks in the historic village, business district, and Route 1 commercial district. Fireworks could only be used between 5-10 p.m. with the exception of Memorial Day, Independence Day, and New Year’s Eve, when they can be used from 5 p.m. until 12:30 a.m.
On July 9 of this year, Waldoboro Select Board member Abden Simmons said he was concerned residents had not understood what they were voting for in 2020 and wanted to give them a chance to reconsider the ban.
Select board member Robert Butler said some residents were concerned about the negative impact fireworks can have on wildlife.
The next question approved for the Nov. 5 ballot concerns local control of food production and distribution.
Waldoboro resident Haley Carmichael originally requested that the town consider a food sovereignty ordinance at a May 28 meeting of the Waldoboro Select Board.
The Maine Food Sovereignty Act, passed in 2017, allows food producers working in a town with a food sovereignty ordinance to sell some products directly to buyers without state oversight.
Carmichael said state licensing requirements and fees place an unnecessary burden on small farmers. With a food sovereignty ordinance, she said, direct farmer-to-consumer relationships rather than government oversight would encourage accountability on the part of both farmers and consumers regarding food safety and quality.
Certain foods, like some forms of meat and poultry products, would still be subject to state inspection under the ordinance.
The third question on the warrant concerns a proposed ordinance that would enable commercial enterprises located in Waldoboro to access state loans for energy efficiency projects.
Through Efficiency Maine, a quasi-state agency that provides information and financing on energy efficiency programs in Maine, these businesses could access low-interest loans to cover efficient building improvements – but only if an ordinance is put in place to establish such a program, said Waldoboro Town Planner Maxwell Johnstone.
Without such an ordinance establishing this program, Waldoboro businesses cannot access such financing programs, according to Johnstone. The town established the residential equivalent to this program, the property assessed clean energy ordinance, in 2011.
The final question on the ballot proposes an amendment to the shellfish conservation ordinance regarding the sale of licenses. According to Simmons, the change is a language clarification that will not affect how licensing is carried out in practice.
The proposed change adds language to the ordinance describing how licenses not initially sold through the town’s license distribution protocol should remain available for purchase until all licenses are sold, either on a first-come, first-served basis or by public lottery.
The amendment also clarifies the number of licenses that must be sold each year, requiring that, if the town is not limiting licenses in a given year, the number of licenses made available must be greater than 10% of the total number of resident licenses sold in the previous year.
Anyone 10 or older who wishes to harvest shellfish in Waldoboro must have an appropriate license issued by the town.
Polls will be open from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 5, at the Waldoboro municipal building. For more information or to request an absentee ballot, call 832-5369 or go to waldoboromaine.org.
